Hello everyone, first I want to say I love fitday!! I'm a 44 year old female soon to be 45 in a month. I have been watching every calorie since January 15th. and keep a journal along with fitday, my problem is I have only lost 10 pounds!! I know a lot may be hormonal because I'm going through perimenopause. I do not exercise rigorously because I have a bad knee, I am very active around the house and yard which are pretty big and I do my exercise bike 3 times a week and walk when I can...usually... I struggle with knee pain a lot but I'm fighting the good fight and trying so hard. I am 5'7 and I need to lose 60 pounds. I actually do really well on my calorie count. I have maybe one or two cheat days a month....I was wondering if there was anyone with similar situation on weight loss and perimenopause?

yup. Frustrating! I'm 47 and it's amazing to me how easy it is to gain weight and how hard it is to lose. The numbers don't add up, either! Sometimes calories in does not equal calories out!
Everyone's different, but things that work for me (I'm sure you've probably heard them all before)[list]
[*]breakfast every morning - usually oatmeal, made 8,000 different ways in the winter time.
[*]LOTS of water
[*]Don't tell myself I can't have junk, but don't keep it in the house either
[*]eat real food! There is a LOT of processed crap that is trying to pass itself off as food - many with healthy sounding names
[*]do something to keep active every day.
[*]Reassessed my goals - realized that when my weight gets lower, more wrinkles appear - at an alarming rate!
[*]Enjoy good food when it's offered! On the other hand, decline when offered food which is just "average" - such as store-bought cookies.

Also, I have rediscovered my love of cooking, and have been enjoying making things from scratch.

I'm of a similar age too and although I'm losing weight well I've had days when my weights gone up even though i know I've not eaten enough calories to be a culprit. I've found I need to be really careful with salt as i retain fluid. this does come off but its very disheartening to see. I retain when I ovulate too and when I'm pre-menstrual - fluctuating hormones are a bitch.

Welcome, IrishLass. I'm struggling with the same issues, only for me they happened after menopause. It is frustrating - I have to eat less and exercise more just to maintain the SAME weight, so losing weight is difficult.

When I feel like "why bother?", I try to remind myself that I'm eating well and exercising not only to lose weight, but hopefully to prevent getting diabetes which both my mother and maternal grandmother had. And I remind myself of the benefits so far - my clothes are looser, I have more energy, and my aerobic endurance has greatly improved.

10 lbs isn't nothing! Keep it up and at the end of the year, you'll have lost 30 lbs more. The weight may not be coming off as fast as you'd like, but at least you're going in the right direction.

You might try changing your diet or exercise to see if that makes a difference. Maybe add some weight training in (I just use various size bottles of water), or on your exercise bike, do a 10-min interval workout instead of a 30-min moderate pace ride. Try a low-carb diet if you're not already doing that. If you're exercising later in the day, try exercising first thing in the morning. Sometimes it takes a change to kick our bodies into a new mode.

Thanks guys, I need to eat breakfast I'm not very good at that. I know when I was 36 I did the very same thing I'm doing now, I mean exactly the same even kept my old journal to refer back to and I lost 50 pounds in about 6 to 8 months. The first 30 fell off then the rest came off later but I gained it all back in the last 3 years ....I do drink a lot of water I use to drink a ton of diet soda but I cut that down to once or twice a month. I retain water like crazy!!! It is so frustrating I just want it off so I can feel better. Since I can not exercise real good, I keep moving all during the day. I do not sit for more then 15 min. at a time up until about 6:00 in the evening. When the weather gets nice I'm going to try walking, I fell in January so its been tricky...Anyways thank you for the replies I appreciate it, I was beginning to think I was going crazy with the perimenopause and the weight.

Thank you, I need to eat breakfast I'm not very good at that. I know when I was 36 I did the very same thing I'm doing now, I mean exactly the same even kept my old journal to refer back to and I lost 50 pounds in about 6 to 8 months. The first 30 fell off then the rest came off later but I gained it all back in the last 3 years ....I do drink a lot of water I use to drink a ton of diet soda but I cut that down to once or twice a month. I retain water like crazy!!! It is so frustrating I just want it off so I can feel better. Since I can not exercise real good, I keep moving all during the day. I do not sit for more then 15 min. at a time up until about 6:00 in the evening. When the weather gets nice I'm going to try walking, I fell in January so its been tricky...Anyways thank you for the reply I appreciate it, I was beginning to think I was going crazy with the perimenopause and the weight. I'm hoping with the warm weather coming soon maybe I will go swimming and that may help

I'm perimenopausal too. My body is holding onto the fat for dear life!
Losing has never been so hard. This site is helping immensely because I can log everything easily and not have to write it in secret code in a notepad so my husband won't know how much I weigh

I know this isn't the best way to go about it but I am using two high protein shakes as breakfast and lunch and doing a reasonable dinner with a couple healthy snacks thrown in. I just wasn't seeing any loss with just trimming a few calories here and there. This short term plan seems to be kick starting the weight loss for me. I'll see how I should modify my diet in a month.

Try a progesterone cream (from the health food store, not a synthetic) to balance your hormones naturally. Most often (according to what I've read over the years), it's not that we lack estrogen--our estrogene and progesterone are out of balance. We see a lot of estrogen prescriptions because synthetic estrogen has been patented and someone makes money from it. I used progesterone cream throughout pre-menopause and never had hot-flashes or other side effects of menopause.

Don't just blindly count calories, make sure that they are not empty calories--processed foods, sugar, etc. Some low-calorie stuff is horrible for your health.

As we age, a lot of us become insulin resistant. Make sure that you're either seeing a doctor periodically or tracking your blood sugar. If you don't want to go to the doctor, you can buy an A1c test at Wal-Mart. Personally, I think it's easier to have the doctor do the A1c, but that's just me.

Watch out for foods that cause inflammation--such as wheat and other processed flours/products. Cut out all processed grain (cereal, bread, cake, etc) for a week or two and see if your joints hurt less. It is the difference between walking with a cane and walking 12-minute miles (without a cane) for me.

Track your food religiously and keep a journal so that you can see the relationship between food and how you feel. You'd probably be surprised. I was...things I used to be able to eat without any problem now cause indigestion and painful inflammation. I wouldn't have know what was causing problems if I hadn't been tracking food and energy/pain levels.

On breakfast...I'm with you, I HATE eating befor 10AM. I have a protein shake and a cup of coffee for breakfast (about 360 days a year). It works for me. Lately, I've been making chia pudding for breakfast. But, you have to plan ahead for that because it takes a few hours for the chia seeds to gel. Use chia seeds (from the health food store or online)...2 TBS, 1/2 cup of Silk unsweetened almond milk, a little Torani SF syrup or sweetener. Mix together, cover, and store in the fridge. I make 6 at a time--it gives me breakfast or an almost-sweet snack in seconds. Don't eat to many servings in one day, though, because chia seeds are very good at keeping you "regular."

Hello everyone, first I want to say I love fitday!! I'm a 44 year old female soon to be 45 in a month. I have been watching every calorie since January 15th. and keep a journal along with fitday, my problem is I have only lost 10 pounds!! I know a lot may be hormonal because I'm going through perimenopause. I do not exercise rigorously because I have a bad knee, I am very active around the house and yard which are pretty big and I do my exercise bike 3 times a week and walk when I can...usually... I struggle with knee pain a lot but I'm fighting the good fight and trying so hard. I am 5'7 and I need to lose 60 pounds. I actually do really well on my calorie count. I have maybe one or two cheat days a month....I was wondering if there was anyone with similar situation on weight loss and perimenopause?

Hi Irishlass1,

I will be 51 in July and I understand what u are going thru. Hormones play a big role in weight loss. Your bum knee don't help either. 10 lbs. in about 12 weeks isn't bad! Slow weight loss is gone stay off more than a quick drop. I have gone from 191.8 lbs. in Jan of 2012 to 163 lbs as of today. It has been a slow drop. I have been stuck at 160 to 165 for several months. I deal with a lot of stress, my hub and I care for his 89 yr. old mom and we are stressed to the max.
When I started this weight loss journey in 2010 I was at 182 lbs. I drop to 165 lbs and than regained after being put on hrt. and cholesterol meds. stopped them and started dropping. I got down to 184 lbs. last June and got a puppy and dropped 10 lbs. in 2 months. Was put on metformin for diabetes and dropped another 10 lbs. and here I sit stuck at my current weight.

This isn't a marathon. We didn't gain this weight overnight. It isn't going to come off overnight. Be patient and continue to do what you are doing. Trying adding 1 extra 10 - 20 minute walk a day to your workout it may give you the boost you need. Just My Opinion.

Good luck. Sounds like your doing everything great. Just them darn hormones.